The Oil Drum

Are we sheep or what?

Well, yes.
Part of us is sheep= herd animal.
Part of us lizard= terrorized lizard brain.

And a wee teeny part of us is rational ... but not in control.

One of the problems with the US in prepping for PO is I think the fact that we are NOT very centrist.  In a representative form of government the populace is going to be more apt to reactively behave instead of proactively behave.  So long as the status QUO is "good" then no changes in voting(at least on energy policy) will occur.

Once things get bad, that is when changes occur.  The old saying "Its the economy stupid" is a perfect example of American (Democracy) reactiveness.  So long as the Economy is "good" voters tend to not rock the boat.  When the economy is bad, that is when politicians go changing(even though politicians don't have as much influence as most voters think).

I really don't think America is going to make an effort to transition until it has something more substantial than a few dollars of gas price increase to react to.

Its a morbid thought, but I almost think forcing Iran into a war, and causing a major oil shock for the world right now could be the best thing for the US in terms of its energy planning(the oil shocks would force us to deal with the problem now as opposed to later when supply is truly diminished instead of artificially diminished through war) and possibly the best thing for the rest of the world as they would see that building their version of the "American Dream" means setting themselves up for dependence.  

Dependence is a notion most nations are keen on only when economic benefits are overwhelming.  Without oil, the economic benefits will disappear and a return to self reliance and localization would have to follow for those countries which want to remain viable.

I suppose in this extreme 'war time' scenario (which is what Cuba went through) I was thinking of examples like:

• Russia 1941-45.  Lost 25 million people, but still managed to beat the Wehrmacht, which was probably the best Army in history up to that point

• Britain 1939-45.  By nearly complete socialisation of the economy, managed to (in 1942) produce more armaments than Germany, despite submarine war.  Highest level of civilian mobilisation achieved by any country other than Russia

More generally, countries with more decentralised decision making may be able to adjust more rapidly.  I can just imagine an American version of decision making which includes considerable civil disorder.

The problem is if the market gives signals early enough.  Right now it gives no signal on CO2, and if PO is a reality, precious little signal of that (I don't count an oil price below its 1980 peak as a signal of PO).

I am a big admirer of the Scandinavian states, eg Denmark, which have obviously taken a long term view of energy supply and self sufficiency.  That said, the Swedes have ducked the problem (they are not for new nuclear, but they don't have a replacement for the nukes they have now).

Also these nations are small, and homogeneous.

We say " the US is not adapting" when we really mean "the US is not adapting fast enough to suit me."  I actually agree with the latter sentiment, but I try to keep things straight.

We do not have a straw man, non-adapting, nation to shoot holes in.

This being a hangover of the Red Army Faction/ Baader Meinhof days.

In terms of centralisation, I probably should have been more specific.  My general impression is Germany has a lot of laws which are applied universally and at each level, the government is quite strong and very involved in managing the economy and society.

I'd certainly heard that Germany is really a confederation of Lander, rather than a nation! ;-).  Frei Stat Bayern, no less ;-).

By contrast the US (I'm not American) really is amazingly fragmented.  Many states have no income tax or other significant tax raising powers.  Private companies are far more powerful and independent politically- it's hard to imagine a German state having the US equivalent of 'employment at will' (ie they can fire you with no cause and no notice or right of redress).

If you go to a place like Texas or Alabama, then the legislature is by law part time, and the governor has almost no power.  The Texas legislature meets only 6 months every 2 years, I believe.  Alabama's Constitution forbids an income tax, I believe.

You'd never find an American state government on the Board of a company like VW, whereas VW is part owned by the State, as are many banks still in Germany, I think.

'national policy' in the US is really quite a fragmentary thing.  It's not like the Chancellor/President proposes a bill which becomes law-- instead both houses pick the thing to bits and amend it left right and centre.

Instead, you need to have a weapon permit, belong to a 'gun club' (trust me, hard to translate - but you have to be a member of a Verein to get your permit), and your weapon(s) are kept at the gun club's shooting range.

Of course, the major difference is that Germans don't think weapons bring about peace - they think weapons bring about death and injury. As so often true here, hard to argue with such a clearly pragmatic viewpoint - after all, German weapon manufacturers try their best to manufature high quality weapons that do just that - and in constant competition with high quality armor manufacturers trying to prevent just that, by the way. Neither the weapon makers or the armorers having any romantic notions about what they do - they are engineers in a very demanding profession, after all.

The number of weapons is certainly much lower than where I grew up in Northern Virginia - but to suggest weapons are illegal, or that a small German community could not produce a few hundred weapons (from handguns to rifles), communally, to meet any realistic threat in an hour or two, is just silly. Notice 'communal' - a lot of weapon owners in American shy away from that concept - it is one of the major reasons they own weapons, to avoid being forced to participate in communal actions. It is equally silly to believe any threat requiring hundreds of weapons to meet it will materialize in anyone's normal existence.

After all, America has just made torture legal and suspended habeas corpus, it seems, and where are the millions of weapon armed patriots on the streets defending liberty and the American Constitution? A lot of delusions in America, a lot of delusions. But the emergency rooms do know how to handle gun shot victims much better than in Germany - the Americans get a lot more daily practice, after all.